One-in-10 Brits splodge brown sauce all over their roast dinner.
Bosses at HP Sauce – invented in 1870 by greengrocer Frederick Gibson Garton in Notts – found that just under 10% of Brits dollop it on roast chicken, beef or lamb, roast potatoes and veg.
Traditionally, roast dinners are accompanied by gravy, with brown sauce more usually dolloped on bacon rolls, sausage baps, chips and fry-ups. One-in-10 of the 2,000 Brits polled, however, said brown sauce was a ‘must’ on a roast dinner – saying they wouldn’t eat one without the tangy sauce as an accompaniment.
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The study found that 52% had brown sauce on a bacon sarnie, 51% with sausages, 45% with a full English, 32% with chips, 28% with meat pies, 27% with cheese on toast, 18% with fish and chips, and 16% with a steak.
(Image: Getty Images)
The ‘shock’, however, came when the study found that 10% slather the sauce all over a Sunday roast.
Those aged 35-54 were most likely, with 14% admitting it, compared to 10% of those aged 55 and over, and just 8% of those aged 18-34.
Regionally, Geordies – like Gazza, Cheryl and Jimmy Nail – were the biggest fans of brown sauce with their roast – with a whopping 20% of folk from the North East saying they couldn’t have a roast without the sauce.
Least likely were folk from Birmingham in the West Midlands, where just 4% said they spurned gravy for the fruity sauce.
Alison Preston, 34, of Edinburgh, said she was ‘horrified’ that folk would add brown sauce to roasts.
(Image: Getty Images)
She said: “It’s bad enough that we in Edinburgh put broon sauce on fish and chips – it’s only in Edinburgh this happens – but to put in on a roast dinner is sacrilege.
“Gravy is what is needed for a roast, not brown sauce, not tomato sauce, not mayo – even cranberry sauce or mint sauce is pushing it as far as I’m concerned.”
Brown sauce lover Terry Porter, 43, of Newcastle, said , however, he had HP Sauce on ‘everything’.
He said: “Brown sauce is my go to for pretty much every meal.
“I have it with a fry-up or bacon roll for breakfast, with cheese on toast for lunch and with a pie and chips for dinner – or a roast on a Sunday.
“It goes fantastically well with roast chicken and suprisingly well with roast beef.”
He said it wasn’t ‘amazing’ with roast lamb, but confessed: “I’d have a dollop of it on anything really – apart from maybe my cornflakes.”
Georgina Fotopoulou, of HP Sauce, said: “There’s no denying that the UK has a longstanding love affair with HP Sauce.
“The tangy brown stuff is famous for complementing some of Britain’s most iconic meals – from fry ups to bacon butties, and even cheese on toast and roast dinners.
“It’s basically a national treasure.”
HP Sauce is so popular with Brits it makes up three-quarters of the brown sauce market in the UK.
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